As an avowed atheist living among a sea of believers (both locally and on the Internet), I have spent a lot of time discussing my beliefs (or lack thereof, as the case may be). The purpose of this blog is not to prove the non-existence of God or "de-convert" anybody from their faith, but simply to preserve some of these discussions and allow me to flesh them out through the process of writing them down, as well as to share them with anybody who might be interested in reading them.

Wednesday, September 6, 2017

I have noticed a very odd phenomena while observing theists interacting with atheists. To wit, atheists tend to say they don’t believe that God exists, whereas theists are constantly trying to get them to admit that they actually do believe that God doesn’t exist.

Sure,
there are some subtle differences between the two statements. It is
certainly possible to have no opinion whatsoever on a subject and, in
that case, it would only be accurate to say you don’t believe anything
about that subject. After all, you can’t affirmatively believe something
is false if you haven’t ever considered it in the first place. For
example, you might say that a newborn baby does not believe in God
because that baby can’t even grasp the concept, and it would be
incorrect to sat that a newborn baby believes that God doesn’t exist.

Similarly,
it is possible that there is so little information available to
actually form a belief in something — no claims of evidence for or
against — that it’s really only possible to say you don’t believe it and
not that you actually believe it is false. For example, most people
would probably say they don’t actually have a belief that there is a
technologically advanced alien civilization on a planet orbiting the
star Antares, but wouldn’t go so far to say that they believe there isn’t
such a civilization there. There’s simply no evidence one way or
another, so the default position is to lack belief without affirmatively
disbelieving.

But what about when atheists
talk about their lack of belief in God? Is it really any different from
having a belief that God doesn’t exist? I would argue that the two
statements are functionally equivalent since (a) atheists who talk about
such things certainly have an opinion on the subject (or else they
wouldn’t be talking about such things) and (b) there are plenty of
arguments and claims of evidence used to support a belief in God as well
as plenty of counter-arguments and counter-evidence to support an
active disbelief in God. So, when an atheist claims that he or she does
not believe in God, it is usually because they are aware of the claims
for God’s existence and they have actively rejected those claims as
lacking in evidence and logical soundness.

So,
why do so many atheists hate to admit they believe God doesn’t exist?
And why do so many theists desperately try to get them to say that they
do? Well, as far as I can tell, it all comes down to a mistaken notion
of the burden of proof. As one atheist I had a discussion with recently put it:

[Stating
a belief that God does not exist] is a description of a strong or
militant atheist, because you believe there are no gods. It is a brave
statement. A belief in the existence or nonexistence of something logically requires proof or evidence, otherwise it is subject to contradiction. I am a plain vanilla atheist, one who just does not believe that gods exist. The lack of belief in anything does not require proof or evidence and is not subject to contradiction. [Emphasis added]

So,
apparently, some atheists believe that stating they believe God does
not exist somehow shifts the burden of proof onto them to somehow
justify their affirmative belief in the non-existence of God. And,
apparently, this is exactly what theists have in mind when they
insist that atheists don’t just lack a belief in God but actually
believe God doesn’t exist.

Except, this is not how the burden of proof actually works.

Yes, it is true that the burden of proof lies upon the person making a claim, but it’s crucially important to understand when somebody is actually making a claim in the first place.

For example, if a theist states that she believes that God exists and an atheist responds that he does not believe
that God exists (or, if you prefer, that he believes that God does not
exist), neither party has any burden of proof whatsoever since neither
one has actually made a claim. Stating a belief is not the same as
making a claim, and a statement of belief does not require justification
(except, perhaps, to validate that you do, in fact, believe what you
say you believe and aren’t just lying).

Here’s the thing, though. Many theists don’t just state that they “believe” that God exists. Instead, they claim that
God does exist. And, not only that, they have all sorts of “proof”
(including logical arguments) to support this claim that God exists.
And, since they are actually making a claim, they have the burden of
proof to actually provide the evidence and arguments in support of that
claim and defend that evidence and arguments against any and all
evidence and arguments to the contrary.

Most atheists, on the other hand, don’t ever claim that God does not exist. They claim that they don’t believe God exists, or that they believe that
God doesn’t exist, but once again a statement of belief — even an
affirmative statement of belief (“I believe God does not exist”) — is
not a claim that carries with it any burden of proof whatsoever.

Even
when atheists get into debates with theists, atheists rarely assert
that “God does not exist.” At most, the atheist will provide evidence
and arguments to rebut the claim by theists that God does exist
and then conclude that the complete lack of good evidence and sound
arguments to support a belief in God should rationally lead to a lack of
belief in God.

So the whole idea of atheists
who claim that God does not exist is basically a straw man cooked up by
theists. But it’s a good topic for discussion, since many theists think
that they can shift the burden of proof onto atheists simply by getting
them to admit that they affirmatively believe there is no God instead of
just that they lack a belief in God. As discussed above, however, it
doesn’t matter if you assert a belief or a lack of belief, since neither
statement carries with it any burden of proof whatsoever.

Having said all that, let me acknowledge that some atheists do, in fact, make the actual claim
that God (at least the God described in the holy books of any world
religion and actually worshiped by anybody) does not exist. And yes, any
atheist making this claim would absolutely have the burden of proof to
back up his claim. Fortunately, for these atheists, the burden of proof
is actually quite easy to meet, since all one needs to do is show that
(a) all logical arguments used to prove the existence of God are unsound
and (b) that evidence that should be there if such a God existed is, in
fact, not there. See, for example, the following:

Keep
in mind this only applies to the God described in the holy books of any
world religion and actually worshiped by anybody. Few, if any, atheists
will ever claim that no possible concept of God exists, since there are
concepts of God out there that are so amorphous as to be wholly
incapable of being proved or disproved. You know, the omniscient,
omnipotent, intangible “spirit” God who exists wholly outside of time
and space and who created the universe and then does not interact with
it in any way. Sure, that sort of God could exist, but who really cares
if it does or doesn’t, since it doesn’t answer prayers, doesn’t perform
miracles, doesn’t proscribe moral laws, doesn’t reward good deeds,
doesn’t punish bad deeds, doesn’t provide for an afterlife or a path to
salvation, etc., and really only exists conceptually as a means of
plugging current gaps in human knowledge (e.g., “where did the universe come from?”).